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Kitchen (TV series)
'Kitchen '''is an American adult animated sitcom created and developed by Ralf Hat for the Fox Broadcasting Company. It was one of the few televised animated series on FOX at the time, and follows the utterly ridiculous and politically incorrect escapades of a trio of Middle Schoolers, Victor McCoy (Bucket Head), Adolf "Pants" Manson, and Chuck Darren, who all live in the corrupt crime-filled city of Mountain Creek, Washington. First premiering on the channel in June 5, 1999, Kitchen was only originally assumed last for one season, until it was later renewed for the production of more. The offensive satire stirred up controversy during its run. Other than that, Kitchen has had a fair viewership over the years, getting at least 1.0 to 4.0 million American viewers per episode. Currently having thirteen seasons, 223 episodes, and plenty of other media, Kitchen has been noticed to be one of the longest series made by Deadpan Productions. Mostly infamous for its aggressive violence, preposterous vulgar language, innuendo and offensive humor, Kitchen has been compared to many other adult television series, on which many are inspirations for the concept. Because of the series censorship, it has been criticized by many positively and negatively. While some acclaim that the series is too offensive for television, others state that the writers should have more freedom on what they write. Because of this, in 2003, a feature film based on the show titled Kitchen: Real & Raunchy was released in theaters with the R rating. In 2000, Kitchen was cancelled and revived a year later on , and later to air its final run on . It is currently running to this day. Premise The series takes its setting in Mountain Creek―a fictional isolated city, located in the cascades of western Washington state. The city is surrounded by forrests and mountains, and is quite infamous for its momentous crime rates, poor education, and ignorant citizens. It is also ran by its dictatorial envious mayor whom has set constant inhumane laws on his people. Overall, Mountain Creek is typically considered to be the "worst town" in the United States, making up 27% of the American crime rate. The main characters include Bucket Head―perverted and pathetic deeply devoted Christian child, overran with anxiety and paranoia, Pants―a greedy and self centered criminally insane antihero, and Chuck―a half-hearted sarcastic child genius. All three of them participate in a school filled with various characters and will usually get involved into situations which may impact them and their surroundings. Most episodes parody various television clichés, often carrying a satirical take on American sitcoms and pop-culture. The humor is largely ignorant and morbid in nature, and its primary focus being the mockery of serious topics including lampooning politics, racism, homophobia, antisemitism, necrophilia, terrorism, and violence. Episodes ''Main Article(s): List of Kitchen episodes Production Kitchen roughly began as a series of shorts made by Hat during his college years (just like how many other shows which he developed first started). The shows setting, "Mountain Creek, Washington" is loosely based off Camden, New Jersey and Bellingham, Washington, two places where the Hat grew up in. The main characters are actually based off of a mixture of Hat and his childhood friends. When asked about what inspired the series overall, Hat responded with "Basically me and my friends lives in a shithole, but just extremely exaggerated with offensive jokes". On behalf of the offensive jokes, Kitchen initially was going to be a series which mainly mocks the liberal/democrat party, something which Hat despises the most. "It was sort of wrong for me to think of one side better than the other, so I decided to mock both political parties" Hat explained. In 1998, Ralf Hat pitched the concept to multiple channels including ( , , , and the FOX Broadcasting Company). FOX contracted Hat to fully develop the first twenty episodes of the series. At this time, only ten to fifteen crew members worked on the show (this includes producers, actors, animators, etc (which is typically low to work on for an animated show). Hat described the first season to "Have a crappier animation/writing style like those gay anti-drug PSAs you see on late night television. The amount of profanity, offensive humor, and graphically intensive imagery in the show was an obvious stir in controversy surrounding both the series and the network. Fox executives attempted to "enforce" censorship on Kitchen, despite the controversy leading the show up to a cult following. Kitchen was unexpectedly cancelled during the eighteenth episode of the second season. Kitchen reruns would be able to be watched on Cartoon Network's late night block, Adult Swim months later, which was founded by Ralf Hat in 2000. Hat revived the show in 2001 on Adult Swim. Now with a rise in crew members, and a growing fandom, Kitchen became a well known Adult animated series. Broadcasting Kitchen airs on Adult Swim in the United States, with new Fridays at 12:00 AM. It also airs on syndication on Vision. In Canada, episodes air on MUCH and Teletoon At Night (ratings may differ). The show airs on MTV in most European countries (2x2 in Russia and VH1 in Sweden). Also, Kitchen airs on Comedy Central in Asia, however most episodes are edited for content. China initially banned the recent season twelve and thirteen, for obvious reasons based on the controversies surrounding both of them. Content ratings * United States (TV-14, TV-MA (including sub-ratings)) * Canada (14+ (MUCH rating only), 18+; 16+ (Quebec)) * Australia (MA15+) * Russia (18+) * United Kingdom & Ireland (12, 15, 18 (home release only) * Germany (16, 18) * South Korea (19) * Mexico (B-15) * Singapore (PG13) * Thailand (PG 18) * Romania (16) Reception Well received critical praise for Kitchen generally came from critics during its revival on Adult Swim. Many would agree that the first two seasons are possibly the worst of the series, and tried too much to be "edgy" or "controversial". As the series later grew on, episodes began to gain positive attention due to Kitchen's morals, satire, and story in general. IMDB has the series with an 8.6, while TV.Com gave the series a 7.4. Controversy Main article: List of Kitchen controversies